Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a piloting aid system of aiding in piloting, or in simulating the piloting of an aircraft and more particularly of an airplane.
Already known are various types of airplane piloting aid systems, which include a display unit and means for displaying thereon symbols representative of determined characteristics of the aircraft's flight and of its environment. Most such known piloting aid systems are rather rugged and unsatisfactory, however. In most known systems, the longitudinal axis of the airplane is used for guidance thereof and is represented for example by a cross or any other symbol on the display screen, and in the event of manual piloting the pilot must endeavor to cause this cross to register with other displayed elements or symbols representing determined characteristic ground features. Such piloting aid systems have the disadvantage arising from the fact that the instantaneous direction of flight of the airplane rarely coincides with the direction of the airplane's longitudinal axis; accordingly, in order to follow a determined path, the pilot is compelled to take into account both the drift and the incidence angle of the airplane. Consequently the inadequacy and unreliability of these prior-art piloting aid systems will readily be appreciated.